Am I meeting their needs? Are they just hanging on and settling, hoping that one day I come around and give them my full attention? Are they getting sexually and emotionally what they signed up for, or are we all just kidding ourselves?

I think this is the type of statement that could be very helpful to others who are mono, finding themselves in relationships with people who are poly. To understand that insecurity isn't just something that they struggle with, but that their existence as "monos" also creates insecurity for the other person. JUST like their poly lover existing as "poly" creates insecurity for them.

I think these are actually questions that can come up in any relationship, be it poly, mono, whatever. Anyone who cares about how they're treating someone else might ask themselves these questions.

These are the issues Shorty grapples with in relation to his limited time and unavailability to be with me, although I've told him repeatedly I'm fine with our casual relationship. He knows I want to be poly, that I'm dating and seeing other people, but still fears that the kind of intimate friendship he wants (with no big commitment to be serious or monogamous) hurts me or is unfair to me in some way. He struggles and feels guilty, thinking that he doesn't give me enough, because he's got so many obligations that take up his time. He's afraid that I am just saying I'm okay with our arrangement yet really waiting to someday "turn him around" (as he put it) into someone who can commit more, like a full-time boyfriend or partner (as in the monogamous model). Apparently women have done that number on him before. I tell him I don't expect more from him than what he gives me now, other than better communication, but he still feels this way.

So, perhaps we might ask ourselves these questions out of looking back at the past and not being fully present to see what is.